What is the difference between attention and consciousness? This lecture describes the scientific meaning of consciousness, journeys on the search for neural correlates of visual consciousness, and explores the possibility of consciousness in other beings and even non-biological structures.

This lecture focuses on how the immune system can target and attack the nervous system to produce autoimmune responses that may result in diseases such as multiple sclerosis, neuromyelitis and lupus cerebritis manifested by motor, sensory, and cognitive impairments. Despite the fact that the brain is an immune-privileged site, autoreactive lymphocytes producing proinflammatory cytokines can cause active brain inflammation, leading to myelin and axonal loss.